The Promise (26 page)

              He smiled sardonically at her, “Not any good ones. That’s why my boss brought you in.

I am having a difficult time imagining that Allison Taylor would be stupid enough to walk across a campus and just hop in a car with someone she has had no contact with. Unlike the girl in North Dakota who was forced to get in at knife point, this would have to be a voluntary situation.

I feel like I know this girl already. I am in her head. She just isn’t the type to fall easily.”

              Chief Parker spoke up, “Special agent Grady, please excuse my detective’s cynicism. He has worked long and hard already on this case.

Is it also possible that this stranger could have prepped Allison Taylor in advance and even arranged to meet her at that corner by the library so it would not have to be a totally random encounter?”

              She nodded in agreement, “Yes, possible. Remember, a predator is shrewd and has been doing this a long time. It would not be difficult for him to set up a situation with a teenage girl if he played his cards right.”

              Gallagher was conceding a little, “Well, in that case I could understand a clever approach, sure. But, that would not make him a total stranger, either.”

              Grady responded, “The profile is not perfect. I just gave you the parameters. The abductor could be a black female, 55 years of age, who knew the victim and the family very well and had no criminal background.

I am just here to give you the general outline. There are exceptions, detective.”

              Parker again, “Who were the most effective predators your agency has ever seen, from a calculating criminal standpoint?”

              She laughed, “You mean, who is in our Hall of Fame of Shrewd and Lewd?”

              The Chief laughed, “Yeah, who are the superstars?”

              “Well,” she began, “You always have to start with the king of killers, Theodore Robert Bundy and his fake cast ploy. His good looks and charm certainly didn’t hurt him, either. Women fell all over him when he approached them for a favor. Unfortunately, the law enforcement authorities found most of them on a hillside months later.

Then, there was John Wayne Gacy who used his contractor business to hire young boys to come work for him. He would often entice them to relax at his home after a long day of work and ply them with drugs and alcohol. Of course, we found a lot of them under that same house.

Aileen Wuornos played the prostitute card to lure businessmen along the road and then shot them.

Both the Green River Killer and the Hillside Stranglers sought out prostitutes and then killed them. In those cases, the women went willingly along because it was their profession to get into cars.

              “Most of those killers were older than your profile suggests,” countered Gallagher.

              “Yes, you are correct. But, most of their victims were older than eighteen years of age. The general rule is the younger the victim, the younger the predator. Remember, same race, approximately same age and usually a different gender, as in male predator, female victim.”

              “I don’t know,” sighed Gallagher, “I am still having trouble getting Allison Taylor into that car voluntarily if she did not know the kidnapper.

Maybe someone came up behind her and stuck a gun in her ribs just as the car pulled up. A team could have done it quietly.

If the predator acted discreetly, she might have acceded to that approach. Then, we would be looking for more suspects instead of just one.”

              Grady was not buying that argument, “That is a possible scenario, but if it were a team of kidnappers there would have been a ransom note.

This was a kidnapping of passion, a removal of an obstacle or revenge, since there was no demand for money.”

Gallagher asked, “A removal of an obstacle?”

The profiler nodded, “Like the mob has to get someone out of the way to continue their business. They hire a hit man to remove the obstacle. Maybe Allison was in someone’s way here.”

              Gallagher summed it up, “This was not a voluntary disappearance and whoever took her does not want any money. I agree with you that this was for sex, revenge, passion, she was interfering with someone’s business or just plain cruelty.

I know it. I feel it. I gotta go. Have a nice day.”

With that, the homicide detective nodded to his boss and stormed out of the conference room leaving the other two participants to mutely stare at each other.

Chapter Forty-
two--a modern day Lazarus?

             
“May I speak with the coroner, please?” queried an edgy Gallagher later that afternoon. “Yes, Mr. Sanders? This is Detective Mike Gallagher of the Athens Police Department. I am following up on a call I made to you a while back.

I need some additional information concerning one of your former, uh, clients, a Mr. Malcolm Oden, excuse me, Mark Halverson, he died of a gunshot wound to the head.”

              “Yes, I’m familiar with you, it was about two weeks ago, I believe, detective,” the county employee answered. “How can I be of service to you, sir?”

              Gallagher pressed, “Well, can you tell me the condition of Mr. Halverson when you embalmed him?”

              “Yes,” Sanders politely responded, “He was dead.”

              “How dead?”

              “How dead, sir?”

              “Yeah, was he positively dead, Mr. Sanders?”

              “Ah, well, he was very dead, yes.”

              “So, he was dead, as in very dead?” confirmed the detective.

              “I’m not sure there are varying levels of dead, Mr. Gallagher. But, as far as dead goes, he was top of the line dead.”

              Gallagher wasn’t sure what else to ask the coroner. “Hmm, is there, uh, well, any chance you had the wrong dead guy?”

              The mortician was confused, “Wrong dead guy? What exactly do you mean, sir?”

              “Well, how do you know it was Halverson?”

              “We don’t know. The police department brought us a cadaver and said it was him. That would be your people, I believe. Maybe you should talk to them. I just embalm ‘em, I don’t interview them.”

              “But, the guy they brought to you was absolutely dead. You’re sure of that?”

              “Yes. If he wasn’t dead when he came in, he was after I got finished with him. We cut the body right down the middle and removed all the interior organs including the…”

              Gallagher looking down at his fried lo Mein with eggplant, “I get the picture. Thank you, Mr. Sanders. I’ll call you back if I need any other information.”

              Sanders wasn’t quite finished with his professional opinions, “His organs, except for his diseased liver, were in excellent shape, detective. He either had a defective liver or he was a boozer because that liver of his was pretty,”

              Gallagher had lost his appetite, “Gotta go!” gagged the detective.

He hung up the phone more confused than before. Mumbling to himself,

“Could Malcolm Oden be alive?  Did he fake his death by, well, how could he possibly fake it? He shot himself, went down, the police found him and carted his corpse to the morgue. That leaves no margin for error?”

He decided to call the officer responsible for bringing Oden’s body in that night. Scanning the police reports, he found his listing,

              “May I speak to Patrolman Winkleman, please?”

              After several seconds he heard a voice, “Winkleman, here.”

              “Patrolman, this is Detective Gallagher in homicide. I’m just following up on the incident involving the assistant headmaster who shot himself out in the woods two weeks ago. I assume you remember the incident since there haven’t been any other guys who have shot themselves lately in the area,”

              “Yeah, I remember. He was dead.”

              Gallagher pulled the receiver back and looked at it strangely. “Yes, Winkleman, of course, he was dead.”

              “Yep!”

              “So, he was dead and, uh, you brought him to the coroner, right?”

              “Well, the ambulance did, yes. But, I checked his pulse and everything, nothing there. So, we put a sheet over him and loaded him up and sent him on his way to the lab for final processing.

Why are you asking, detective?”

              “I’m just doing routine follow up, in the event he wasn’t really dead…”

              “What?”

              “Well, I am looking into the possibility that this guy is still roaming the earth. The scenario would be that he was not totally dead when you found him, got into the ambulance and somehow between there and the hospital killed someone else, switched the body and then, this sounds crazy doesn’t it, Winkleman?”

              “With all due respect, detective, yes it does,” the officer agreed condescendingly. “I checked his identification.”

              Gallagher felt like a fool, “So, nothing out of the ordinary that night, huh?”

              “No, sir, just a guy with a gun in his hand, and a gunshot wound to his head. That’s it. And, a few freaked out college kids who had their date nights seriously disturbed. They are still alive, by the way.”

              “Okay, Winkleman. Thanks for the life and death byplay. Bye.”

Hanging up the phone, he walked over to Chief Parker’s office. “Hi, boss, got a minute?”

The Chief nodded, “What’s up, Mike?”

              “Well, it’s been an interesting six hours. I was at the memorial service today and I saw one of the mourners jotting down notes which I copied over his shoulder.”

He showed the Chief the notes. “Abruptly, the guy left and all I got was his license plate. YGG145. When, I checked it out, the car registration belonged to a Malcolm Oden.”

              His boss responded, “He’s dead.”

              Gallagher finally laughed, “Yeah, that’s been made apparent to me all afternoon.

So, if he’s dead, who’s the guy making these notes and driving his car?”

              As his boss studied the notes Gallagher made, he looked perplexed, “I don’t know, Mike. These notations are related to Odin’s mythological history. Odin only had one eye, it blazes like the sun. Grungir,, that is the name of his spear. The final battle was called, Ragnorak. It sounds like this fellow wants revenge on a murderer.

But, who is the murderer and who is the one you saw writing down the notes. If Oden is dead, I mean, he is dead, who is this character?

Maybe he is just some nut case
.”

              “He is a nut case driving Oden’s Mercedes?”

              “Let’s check with the family. They might know who the guy is.”

              “Good idea. I’ll give them a call. Maybe I’ll wait a day.”

              “If Oden is really alive, wouldn’t that be something, huh?”
 

             
“Yeah, boss, that would be a doozy. But, I don’t think it’s possible.”